Why doesn’t the government do something about energy companies?

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

Energy is too important to be handled in such a cavalier manner (AFP/Getty)

How have we got into this ridiculous situation in which the energy giants make obscene levels of profit, while everybody else worries about the cost of energy and whether they will survive the hike in prices?

Why does the government not oversee this situation and do something about it?

We have a multitude of so-called energy suppliers who are acting like parasites, sitting between producers and customers. These companies gamble on the future price of energy and offer “good” deals to attract customers. The financial experts were encouraging us to keep changing suppliers. ie, join in the fun of gambling! Of course, the whole system went pear-shaped as some of these “suppliers” went bankrupt and the government had to pick up the pieces.

Energy is too important to be handled in such a cavalier manner. The whole industry desperately needs to be reorganised, with a sensible permanent tax on all of the energy giants.

Robert Murray

Nottingham

Brexit comes with a responsibility

I read Dan Byam Shaw’s article on Channel crossings with great interest and agreement. It always appears to me that the government is more interested in the problem than the solution. It is an indisputable fact that the option to come here legally is virtually non-existent because, as he states, basically all safe and legal routes have been shut down. So desperate men, women, and children are forced to make dangerous journeys – courtesy of people smugglers in often unsafe boats.

It was illuminating to read that 60 per cent of the arrivals are eventually granted refugee status. So, Shaw is correct to say we should reinstate the safe and legal routes. Britain since Brexit has wanted to be seen as a global nation, but with that aspiration comes humanitarian responsibilities. Continually circling an issue without honing in on the answer is a government patently not seeing the wood for the trees – or, in this case, desperate people in search of sanctuary.

Judith A Daniels

Norfolk

The BBC chairman is taking a page straight out of the Boris Johnson playbook

Having listened to BBC chairman Richard Sharp as he attempted to remove himself from the tawdry events surrounding loans to Boris Johnson and then his own appointment, I was left feeling that it was straight out of the Boris Johnson playbook.

This is a man who is reported to have donated around £400,000 to the Conservative Party, enjoyed cozy dinners at Chequers and worked as a financial adviser to Johnson when he was mayor of London – before acting as an adviser to Rishi Sunak in the Treasury. He should not be in charge of the BBC, an institution that we respect for its accurate, impartial views.

John Dillon

Birmingham

The real problem with the House of Lords

Jonathan Longstaff argues in his letter that bishops should stay in the House of Lords because the Bible has given this country guidance over many centuries. But why should we accept that Christians have moral authority over all other faiths on how to lead our lives? Is not the real problem with the House of Lords that other faith leaders are missing?

Kartar Uppal

West Midlands

Sunak is digging a hole for himself

Controversies continue to dog Rishi Sunak’s government with the latest reshuffle of Whitehall departments (costing millions of pounds) during a cost of living crisis, while the rest of us are having to tighten our belts. His one success seems to be in digging a hole for himself into which he looks set to disappear. We can then expect Michael Gove – who asked to remain put – to be on hand to level it up!

Roger Hinds

Surrey

We won’t solve any of our problems by leaving the ECHR

Of all the hare-brained schemes from a damaging austerity policy to Brexit and ideologically motivated “fiscal events” that successive Tory governments have inflicted on the British public, Rishi Sunak’s reported consideration of leaving the European Convention on Human Rights to “solve” the small boats crisis is perhaps the most bizarre. It has been reported that in the previous 20 years, up until 2020, almost 300 lives were lost by people illegally crossing the Channel. The dangerous and illegal passages are only a reality because the government will not provide safe and legal routes. The people traffickers exist because the government gifts them their market.

Likewise, the ongoing crisis in the NHS led Dr Adrian Boyle, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, to say that between 300 to 500 people are dying “as a consequence of delays and problems with urgent and emergency care each week”. The performance problems in the NHS exist because of underfunding as a result of the austerity-driven policies in successive Tory governments.

Neither problem can be solved by leaving the ECHR.

It is clearly realistic and feasible to stop the boats and save the lives of vulnerable people fleeing persecution. It is equally realistic and feasible to properly fund the NHS and save many more. It’s a matter of political dogma overriding good management and good sense.

David Nelmes

Newport